Counting on coupons to bring down price to a comparable level isnt a valid argument to me, nor is "great people" behind the shop. Nor is word location. Sure, if you live in the same country, an mark-up may not be as noticable, since you factor in higher shipping from abroad, but that doesnt mean anything for the price of the product itself, since every shop factors in a certain markup to cover their freight costs to begin with. My estimation is based on world wide shipping, which SAG provides.

Ive compared their prices with shops in hong kong, across europe (mostly uk), north america, and i still find them higher than most. Again, if you happen to LIVE in USA, where SAG is based, the mark-up may not be a factor for you. But if you need to go world wide in the first place, it certainly is.

For example, i find a shop called "www.collectorscardsandgames.com" to have very low prices on most their stuff, whilst other US competitors have prices that are almost double. and they all focus on NTSC format retro games. I do shop around out of necessity, and i like to think i have a somewhat good grasp on the generic pricepoint connected to the stores i know of. Im not disrespecting SAG and their service or businessmanners simply because i think they carry high pricetags, im just stating that they do.

Everyone is free to shop where they want, but i do believe if we want this particular 3DO item, we will see a significant markup from SAG, even if you already live in USA, compared to buying directly from the russian guy. And thats why i think we're getting screwed if he ends up ignoring our initiative in favour of going through SAG.

Lots of trustworthy shops out there besides SAG. The markup differs from a lot of shops evidently, and im assuming those in usa all pay pretty much the same shipping from east europe for the everdrive-related products.

No, i could not have bought it from the russian earlier as neither did i know about him or the item, nor was the item im interested in even available when he had stock. The point of this thread and contacts made with him was to get him to make more, so we could buy from him. Its difficult to buy an item that doesnt exist, from an individual youve never heard about.

That's true, but to some extent, you'll get what you pay for. I wouldn't use CC&G as a positive example, as I placed an order with them recently, and my experience was very mixed.

Long story short, I wanted a couple 32X games that they had at excellent prices, and threw in a few other things to fill out my order. It took several weeks of back-and-forth to get my order finalized, and then right at the end he told me he didn't have the 32X games.

Yet they're still listed on the website, and he hasn't removed them. It felt a little bit like I was getting hit with a bait-and-switch, where the attractive prices were meant to get me to commit to a larger order -- and then if those items weren't available and I backed out, I'd be accused of wasting his time.

I also sent him a list of boxes & manuals I needed (which he invites customers to do on the website), but the whole exchange was weird. He seems to expect that you'll send him your list, wait a couple weeks for him to search his inventory, and then pay whatever price he names if he happens to have the item. This is what he eventually wrote about my box list:

At a glance on your box list there are only 2 that I would be willing to sell right now assuming I have them which I probably do.

He then listed two boxes from my list, of which one was moderately overpriced, and one was reasonable but not something I wanted to deal with trading 2-3 more emails to get.

Then when I said "OK, we'll skip those, but what about the list of manuals I sent?" his reply was:

The only other manual I might have is [...] but its not worth the time to look for the $1 I would charge when you didn't want the other ones either.

It's just kinda weird and passive-aggressive: "I don't actually know if I have these boxes, but if you don't promise to buy them, I'm not going to bother to look for manuals."

Finally, he made a typo when he sent me the final invoice, undercharging me by $10. When I double-checked -- "Are you sure it's not supposed to be more?" -- he acknowledged the error, but didn't bother to thank me. Somehow that annoyed me most of all; that's just bad manners.

That said, he seems to mean well, some of his prices are quite good, and the items I got from him were in good shape (though not well-packed -- no bubblewrap IIRC, just stuff in a box with some newspaper). But overall I didn't get a good vibe from the experience. If you don't update your inventory listing after telling a customer you don't have an item, you're either too scattered or slightly sketchy.

SAG may be more expensive, and personally I wouldn't buy "regular" games from them -- usually I buy on message boards or Ebay, but among online retailers, I'd probably turn to GameTrog or Trade-N-Games. But they provide a worthwhile service for the EverDrives they sell, and they do a very clean job, so their markup is by no means unreasonable.

If you want to get the lowest possible price on those, then sure, order from somewhere else -- I think SAG would happily advise you to do the same. If they end up with an exclusive deal on the 3DO IDE adapter, that would be unfortunate, but I highly doubt they'll be the only vendor for them in the long run.

Well, looking at how that shop is set up, to me its pretty straight forward that you actually have to email him to ask what he has got in, and in what condition things are in if you, like i, are fairly anal about condition and availability.

The lists of games can be months old if you actually check when they were last updated, stands to reason they wont be up to date when you look at them, perhaps a month later.

So im sorry you had some issues, but in MY personal experience, if you email him, telling him what you want and doing some research with him before you place an order, you wont be disapointed.

I think its pretty obvious his main venue is NOT the website or for people buying a single or just a few games. Or he would have an actual webshop with accurate inventory etc. He told me, when i asked him to confirm international shipping, that he sells A LOT of games and systems to one of swedens few retro-game webshops (which use ridiculous markups not even defendable with import fees, shipping costs and moderate profit gain), because they buy in bulk.

My experience with him was similar in terms of communication, took a few back and forth emails to sort the details out, but he shipped my 32x system and games out quick once i sent payment, and well packaged too, for a low shipping cost (much lower than people on ebay, for example, who use "handling"-costs to maximize profits and not get slapped with sellers fees), so i was happy with that.

I dont think the markup SAG does on regular stuff is worth it just because they have a webshop with accurate inventory count. If i can get the game at sometimes even half the price by sending a few emails, i will.

As for SAG and possible exclusivity of the 3DO IDE adapter, i dont know about that either naturally, but i dont think there will be a question of "in the long run" regarding these adapters. I think the guy will produce a run or maybe two, because demand for this item is not really significant as is evident of this thread. 10-20 people on basically the only dedicated 3DO forum online (which is in the top searchs on google and thus easy to find) has committed to buying. True, might be more people, like myself, who didnt know of these things and still might not, but i dont think those number in high enough to keep a constant production run "in the long run" even with SAG-exposure. just look at ever-drives, then dont run for too long either from what ive gathered. But i could be wrong there.

So in conclusion, yes a shop like collectorscardsandgames is not a dedicated webretailer (in my experience) and his inventory lists are not updated often enough, but he was easy to communicate with, and he does move A LOT of items and keeps low prices on most stuff. It just takes a little more effort to confirm he has what you want. And im not satisfied paying 20-40% more for simple convenience on a regular basis, or on high price games/items.

It should be pretty clear that yes, ive only discussed the price tag, since that has been my point all along. Like most people, i dont like paying more than i have to for the same or equivalent item.

I ask you to clarify "You should be able to assume all that with just a glance. I didn't bother debating this point because grimm just sees $." though, because im not sure what you mean by that. I personally am fully aware that the site's inventory lists arnt updated frequently (which i thought was pretty clearly stated in my previous post), as he even puts a date when it last were. So if your comment ment that "You pay more to get a snazzy looking well updated webshop with automatically updated inventory an shopping cart, and lots of Flash-animations etc", then yes you are correct. I dont need or want to pay for that if it means significant markups on the items for sale.

Another shop that seems to have a significantly lower pricepoint than SAG is Goatstore.com. They do have an automatic cart system and still dont carry a higher price point on their items. For europe, you could compare www.consolepassion.co.uk 's prices and they would be the SAG of europe in that regard.

You may think its worth paying significant extra because a shop looks good, is more convenient for you etc, which is fine by me, but dont say stuff like "because grimm just sees $" because im more budget-oriented than perhaps you are. If im mistaken, again, please clarify what you ment by that.

grimm wrote:So im sorry you had some issues, but in MY personal experience, if you email him, telling him what you want and doing some research with him before you place an order, you wont be disapointed.

Well, I did exactly that: I sent him a detailed list, asked questions about condition, patiently waited several weeks for him to get back to me, and was very polite throughout the whole process.

He just seemed to have a weird chip on his shoulder about time wasters -- he wants you to email him your wantlists, but seems to resent the time he has to spend looking through his inventory to find what you're asking for. He really can't have it both ways: either you spend the time maintaining your online inventory, or spend the time looking manually. But either way, it's not the customer's fault.

grimm wrote:I think its pretty obvious his main venue is NOT the website or for people buying a single or just a few games.

In my case, I was asking to buy 9 games outright, plus whatever manuals and boxes he might have from my list. Had he had the 32X games in stock, it would've been $50+ before shipping, which isn't a $200 order but isn't $5, either.

Either way, I'm not sure why his business model is my concern. If we're going to be hard-asses about price, then it's no less legitimate to be a hard-ass about customer service, right? And in that department, my experience with CC&G left a bad taste, whereas I was happier with (for example) Trade-N-Games who made an effort to treat me like a valued customer, rather than an unwelcome intrusion.

Also, my time is worth something, and the emails I had to trade with CC&G didn't feel like time well spent. It felt like he was only half-reading what I'd written, and I had to repeatedly double-check or remind him of things (he completely forgot about my box/manual wantlist).

So if price is your #1 concern, and you don't care whether the vendor actually has an item before spending your time making an inquiry, then sure, you'll get some good deals there. But again, I wouldn't hold him up as a paragon. Dealing with him was, to be blunt, kind of a pain in the ass and not really worth it to me, especially if he doesn't actually have the items advertised in his inventory (BTW, those 32X games have been listed for over a year).

EDIT: FWIW, I do think StoneAgeGamer's used game inventory is often priced too high. (I have zero problem with their EverDrive pricing, though.) But that said, there are other retailers who have competitive pricing and maintain accurate inventories and have good manners and customer service, and it's those retailers who are apt to get my business when there's something I need and can't find on the boards.

Fair enough goldenband. I hope you can find a store thats a happy medium then.

Im not being a hardass, i was arguing a point. The price point. I buy stuff on ebay damn it, ebay if any place has inflated prices.. But i try to find what i want elsewhere before i go to ebay.

But i disagree, if "i" wanted to be a hardass about the price, then low is what id go for regardless if that means more troublesome sellers, communication, whatever, since its the low price im being a hardass about. If i was a hardass about customer service, then price wouldnt be my "hardassness". I hope you understand my point there. Regardless, good customer service is NOT a legitimate reason to jack up the prices in my opinion. Its just an excuse. As a merchant you should be obligated to have good customer service regardless. If you have an actual customer service department with people hired only to do that job, i can see a justification for some increase in price. But the shops we are discussing here do not have that, i think i can bet my life on that. Its just the person who would handle your order regardless, who takes on CS concerns should you have questions or concerns about items you wish to buy. So no, in my book good customer service is not a reason to jack up prices.

grimm wrote:If i was a hardass about customer service, then price wouldnt be my "hardassness". I hope you understand my point there.

Well, it's possible to do both: demand the lowest possible price and the best possible customer service. (Whether that's reasonable is another issue!)

grimm wrote:Regardless, good customer service is NOT a legitimate reason to jack up the prices in my opinion. Its just an excuse. As a merchant you should be obligated to have good customer service regardless.

I agree with your last sentence, but the problem is that "jack[ing] up the prices" is a somewhat loaded phrase. For one, it implies that the prices are being inappropriately increased from some theoretical number that they "should" be, which is a very slippery consideration when you're dealing with used merchandise which has no fixed price (vs. MSRP and retail markup).

More broadly, I do think that sellers (both online merchants and individuals) set their prices based, in part, on the level of care they put into their sales chain. If a seller is meticulous about taking pictures, offers detailed condition reports, buys premium/unused packing materials, and makes a point of being in constant, clear communication with customers, then their prices are likely to trend high. If a seller takes few or no pictures, will only supply condition information when asked, uses recycled or minimal materials, and communicates sporadically and doesn't seem to properly read emails, then their prices may trend low.

And that actually seems fair to me! Everybody "should" offer great customer service, but not everyone does. You could say that people who charge more and have great customer service are charging for it -- but you could also say that people with cheaper goods and crappy service are, in effect, offering a discount to compensate for their lackadaisical attitude. Either way, customer service does have a $$ value, and the market sometimes reflects it.

(And sometimes stuff is just overpriced, of course, whether it's being sold by super-helpful people or indifferent jerks.)

But again, i was discussing price point and ONLY price point. Not customer service.

As for demanding both, thats exactly what i tried to emphasize at the end and i cant do it much clearer than i did in my previous post. I do not shop from stores who dont have at least average customer service, and i also dont shop from stores who think its a service you as a customer should PAY for, that is outright insulting. "Hey, shop with us if you want a good experience, but we're gonna mark it up a lot just because we want more profit out of you". Its your responsibility as a merchant to stand by your products, and lend support and answer questions a possible customer may have. The phrase "customer SERVICE" is something i reluctantly use, since it ISNT A SERVICE. Its a right you as a customer should be able to expect anywhere. But if you live in america, i can understand why you'd think its a service you pay extra for, since your economical machine is all about selling and consuming, and the more excuses you can use to raise the price, the better. Here in Sweden it works differently, even if its rapidly becoming "USA" here too.

As for "premium" packing materials, vs used, ill go with used any day of the week, because if we dont learn to recycle and reuse materials then we can say bye bye to our habitat, world wide.

I have no idea what "lackadaisical" mean so i cant comment on that, but no, customer service is NOT a premium service you should have to pay for. nor is it a discount if you receive poor customer service from a merchant with lower prices. it should simply be there, and sufficiant for the customer to be at least content. If its better than that, that itself should be enough of a draw to pull in customers. Its not something you can charge extra for, if so, you should be able to tick that off in the checkout, as you can with any other service not being the product you are buying. Since im starting to repeat myself now i dont think i have much more to add. You are free to disagree and have your own opinion as always, but i will never consider "customer service" a premium service you should be charged for, if it doesnt actually mean hiring a person to do that exact job and thus raising your expenses with another paycheck to consider. Anything else is just an excuse to get more money out of you.

grimm wrote:The phrase "customer SERVICE" is something i reluctantly use, since it ISNT A SERVICE. Its a right you as a customer should be able to expect anywhere. But if you live in america, i can understand why you'd think its a service you pay extra for, since your economical machine is all about selling and consuming, and the more excuses you can use to raise the price, the better.

Aha, I think you're missing something here: in the United States, customers tend to be every bit as cutthroat as vendors, and will ignore every other consideration in favor of price. Businesses like Wal-Mart haven't succeeded by raising prices, but by lowering prices -- and they do that by insisting their suppliers sell to them as cheaply as possible, sometimes so cheaply that the suppliers are forced to either make no profit or cut corners in their product (by e.g. moving production to China, using dodgy materials, and so on).

The race to the bottom -- low prices at all costs -- is every bit as toxic as "the more excuses you can use to raise the price, the better". Right now (and I'm not saying this to be rude), it sort of sounds like you're arguing that way.

grimm wrote:As for "premium" packing materials, vs used, ill go with used any day of the week, because if we dont learn to recycle and reuse materials then we can say bye bye to our habitat, world wide.

Oh, I completely agree -- I personally use recycled packing materials for all the items I sell or trade -- though that's probably not practical for large vendors. Really, the issue is that the cheapskate vendors I've encountered use a few bunches of newspaper, or sometimes no packing material at all!

grimm wrote:I have no idea what "lackadaisical" mean so i cant comment on that

"Uninterested" or "lazy", basically.

grimm wrote:but no, customer service is NOT a premium service you should have to pay for.

Again, I think you're phrasing this in a loaded way. Good customer service always costs the vendor money -- at a minimum it costs materials, time, and energy, and it sometimes costs replacement items or return shipping where another vendor would say "screw you, caveat emptor". Vendors who have crappy customer service can sometimes offer lower prices because they don't bother with any of that; they just sell the item, move it out the door as cheaply as possible, and that's that. If they get a reputation for being unprofessional, it doesn't matter since their prices are still the lowest.

You seem to have this idea that vendors are gleefully saying to themselves "Ha ha, I can screw my customers by charging them extra for what they already deserve!" But I think that's too simplistic -- if anything, it's often the cheapo, screw-you vendors that seem to be flipping consumers the bird. If you say "I automatically deserve the best customer service for free, so it doesn't factor in when I'm deciding where to buy", then you are basically saying "Price is all that matters to me", because in the short term it's always cheaper to offer shitty customer service.

End result? The people who have shitty customer service are probably the ones who will get your business, because their prices are likely to be the lowest. If you have a bad experience, then you'll just move on to the next "cheapest prices" business until they too disappoint you, and so on. That makes you a very American consumer, I'm afraid.

Of course there are businesses that offer low prices and have great customer service. But they're few and far between, because it's hard as hell to make money and offer great customer service. If you can save a buck per item by not updating your inventory, not buying bubblewrap, sending out items in shitty condition, spending an hour trolling Craigslist for resale lots instead of reading customer email, etc., then you can charge 50 cents less than your competitor, have lower prices and make a bigger profit too.

Anyway, I don't want to belabor this, but I really do think there's a flaw in your thinking -- you're seeing it from your point of view, but not making an effort to see the big picture. I love low prices as much as anyone, but everything has a cost, and the customer always pays one way or the other.

You have not understood the point ive been trying to make and i will make no further attempts to try and have you understand.

My opinions and reasoning is no more flawed than yours. This is not empiric fact we are discussing, but opinions. Mine is not flawed simply because i dont agree with you.

"Stuff laying in a warehouse unsold does not cost money, the rent on the warehouse does however". If you cant see the logic in that statement, you have simply not understood the point ive been trying to make, and i will not repeat myself about that any further. Either way is fine with me as im not out to make you agree.

Ive put no moral or importance into either way when it comes to customer service, ive simply discussed that its not a premium service. If you think materials is customer service then i can only say that you should reconsider what customer service is. Since you dont specify, i assume you mean packing materials. This is not a service. Logistics is, packaging it into something is not. That MIGHT be considered handling, but it is not a service. Nor is the choice of material you use.

I dont know how customer rights laws work in the US, or wherever you are from, but in sweden, if a buyer buys something online or through mailorder, you have 14 days to regret that purchase for whatever reason. This is not customer service, the customer pays for all return shipping. If a product arrives broken and needs replacing, that is also not customer service, that is a question of insurance, if you paid for that. You also have warranty by law which requires the seller to replace, repair or refund you for any manufacturer flaw that creeps up in a NEW goods for up to 3 years, i dont remember how long for used, but several months at least.

Again, before you call my opinion a flaw, and claim "you're seeing it from your point of view, but not making an effort to see the big picture", then you have the same flaw. You only see how things work where YOU are, and thus dont understand where im coming from with MY reasoning. These shops we have discussed ship world wide, i do see the "big picture" as i am subjecting myself to other business models than whats being run in the US. I buy from japan, i buy from hong kong, i buy from china, i buy from all over europe, and i buy from the USA, and universally, USA is the only place where you pay "premium" for customer service. China and Hong Kong has always been exemplary with customer service in my case. Im into airsoft, which is predominantly ran by asian companies and thus buy items A LOT from asia. If there is a problem there. They simply say "take a picture and we'll send full refund", they dont require me to resend the item, unless its a gun or something, they just take the cost and ship me a replacement or a full refund and let me keep the broken, wrong or unusable item. And this from companies who charge MUCH less than american or european airsoft stores (or even major asian airsoft stores), where they claim "our prices are higher because with us you have warranty" or some other BS.

Quick example, i asked two different swedish airsoft retailers to import a gas blowback pistol (swedish customs seize these adressed to private citizens because of a grey area in the law, where as retailers can import freely), one shop made a markup of around 40% from the Hong Kong store they would get it, another market it up 70%, from the very same store in Hong Kong. The actual cost to import that item would be around 30%, so there you go. One store wanted 10% for itself, the other wanted 40%. And you know what their reason was? They claimed "its a service we believe is worth paying extra for, because you get warranty from us and not from Hong Kong". Funny, that warranty is protected by LAW, and you have the same warranty from the shop asking 10% in profit too.

I am WELL AWARE of the big picture, and the big picture is that yes, companies ARE only interested in your money. They will use every trick in the book to get it, if not, they will not survive the capitalist system of "competition". Profit is everything, you need to understand this as a business, or you will fade away. So no, my reasoning is not flawed, I simply dont argue, reason or discuss (whichever way you wanna put it) the same points as you do. I have imported over 600-700 items from probably 4-500 different vendors/sellers/shops over a span of 10 years and this means i MUST consider their return policy, their customer service feedback etc, to know i buy from the right places, in order to get as little hassle as possible if something goes wrong. This has not happened more than 10 times.

It is also not fair to compare SAG-type businesses and the point i tried to make about them trying to get as much profit as they can, with a chain like Wall-Mart. Wall-Mart deals with VOLUME. SAG does NOT. For volume sellers, as cheap as possible is definetly the way to go. A store like SAG can get away with high prices because they dont sell necessities, everyday items, practical things, like a store like Wall-Mart. Trust me, i understand this picture perfectly well, since the worlds richest man, Ingvar Kamprad (Ikea founder) created the worlds most profitable chain around the very same principle. Buy cheap low quality stuff that lasts a decent amount of time to be attractive to the largest customer base at as low a cost as you can, and sell in volume. You simply can not compare the two very different business models.. You can bet your ass Rolls Royce (or VW as it were) would sell a lot more cars if they were cheaper, but thats is not their business model. They think their car is better, because its more luxurious and has more convenience built in. It may ride smoother, it may be more quiet, and it may offer customization at a great level, but do most people think its worth paying for that even if they could? No, they will buy a car that gets them from a to b and is safe for their families.

Again, i get the big picture just fine, and i can see where you are coming from to, I will simply not accept that as an acceptable way to do business. That is not flawed, that is simply my opinion and is not required to be shared.

Briefly, because (1) this discussion needs to be done with and (2) for some reason the site is taking forever to load on my machine:

- The Swedish laws you describe are NOT the case in the United States. AFAIK, there are no statutory warranties whatsoever for used goods (not sure about new), and no statutory return policy for all consumer goods. (It's difficult to be 100% categorical since these are usually state laws, and there are 50 different states, but the only likely exceptions are for cars.)

- If you're criticizing a US business like Stone Age Gamer, I think it's fair to say the US is the automatic frame of reference here. It's great if Swedish laws give you extra protection, but I doubt that applies to imports, and if not then they're sort of irrelevant (and how would the Swedish gov't enforce it anyway?).

- It doesn't really matter what you call it -- "customer service" is one word -- but the point is that for everything beyond "throwing the item in a box", there's a continuum ranging from zero to awesome. Everything the merchant does costs money, and that's the big picture you're not seeing: not that "all companies want is your money", but that the price you pay will often reflect the level of service you get because providing good service is expensive, whether you express that cost in actual currency, in time and energy, or whatever. That's an empirical fact, but you're not acknowledging it because you see good service as an entitlement -- which it may be under Swedish laws, but not in most of the world (I'd be willing to wager $10 that Swedish consumer protection laws are probably among the world's most generous).

- I think you paint a MUCH rosier picture of Asian customer service (especially Chinese) than is actually the case. I don't have to look hard to find plenty of examples of people who've been screwed by Chinese businesses.

I will make one last contribution, then i will end my participation in this debate as im not making myself understood with you at all, and im not blaming either of us for that.

1. I brough up swedish warranty laws and practices only to help you understand my base values, opinions and "where im coming from". Not to be right or wrong This has evidently failed as you still seem to think US practices supersedes everything else. I criticized SAG as they are, yes an american company, but dealing _internationally_, and therefor competes with international companies in the same field, thus cant be judged simply by american standards. I also brought up a (at least in europe) well known UK company called consolepassion.co.uk, which evidently see lots of international business, and is doing well, which also charges higher prices than most their competitors. They certainly cant be judged by american standards, if they arnt an american company? At least not by your logic, yet still they operate much the same way. Using a good reputation, to be able to charge more for their games.

2. Dont say it doesnt matter what _i_ call customer service, and then specify it yourself. I chose the middle ground since i DO SEE THE BIG PICTURE, and that customer service means different things in different parts of the world and to different people. Again, the american understanding of the word is not universal, and you will find many non-americans agreeing with me, that us companies take things a few steps further in terms of grading it as a grounds for raising price than many other companies do. those companies most often value it highly, but that is not the same as raising the price accordingly. word of mouth is actually more powerful in that regard. That customer service costs money in time, energy or "whatever" is not Empirical Fact. Its a business model and a way of economical reasoning which not even all economists agree on. Business models are not empirical facts. Empirical facts has to do with science proved beyond theories with experiments and practical applications. No economic system has been proven scientifically. As for seeing CS as an entitlement, yes i do do that, and i wish more people would so we'd both see more of it, and no increase in price due to it. Keep in mind that having a good customer service, even the way you define it, doesnt automatically mean you have to replace this or that, or have higher costs in packaging material and what not. Customer service in essence is "common sense". Act professionally and you will get more business. Acting unprofessionally can and usually do cause your business to LOSE money and go under.

3. I do not paint a much rosier picture of asian customer service. It is actual experience which i also tried to elaborate on. believe it or not, but USA has a culture of demonizing asian countries when it comes to quality, customer service and related things, because many companies are moving there production there, and jobs are lost. In order to keep american businesses legitimate and competitive, you are told "american made is much higher quality, you get much better customer service here" etc etc.. Which isnt necessarily true,, but has caused a lot of prejudice towars asian business, in particular chinese.. I am not bashing america here, the same thing happens in sweden, and most other western countries. Asia, and china in particular, are getting our companies' business because they can build items cheaper, whilst maintaining high quality. Mainly because of wage-slaves and horrid working conditions. So yes, it all comes down to them wanting our money as profit, and a much higher profit margin is possible in china compared to usa or sweden. Have good customer service or not. Besides, most the stuff in our homes are made in asia, regardless of if you buy them directly from asia, or via a retailer in your town.

if you still think im unaware of the big picture when it comes to business and greed, well then i dont know how else to show you that i am not. I have been unemployed most my adult life, despite having several attractive licenses and certifications within the industrial sector, simply because i can not work full time, and therefor am too expensive to hire, or at least most companies reason that way. So i understand economics better than most people do, and what companies will do to maximize profits, customers and workers be damned.

I will simply leave the discussion here, and let you believe what you will.

I dont think its lost for good. just this deal. Keep look out at Stoneage Gamer, it seems he will be selling it at some point at least. Im hoping someone can still make our original deal here in this thread happen, but doesnt seem likely now. If indeed Stoneage Gamer will sell it, dont delay and buy it quickly, who knows what will happen if this russian guy jumps his commitments like this, if indeed he actually DID commit to it. Im starting to doubt it since we havent heard anything from 3DO Experience's contact in what, 6 months now?

He never made a commitment to us. He simply wouldn't do it unless there were enough orders. When we finally had enough orders he was going to have to travel to Moscow to get parts. Sometime between that and now he skipped us and made a deal with SAG for a test batch in order to try and secure a larger deal with them.

This doesn't necessarily mean we won't get ours from him. It does mean anything he would have made for us recently went to SAG. Even if he decides he no longer wants to deal with people other than SAG it doesn't mean that buying them may go smoother for most of us. Yes they might cost more due to SAG being an extra step, yes they might jack up the price simply because they can.

All this could happen but I'm tired of the arguing. It already happened in this thread before, it's happening now, and it's things like this that made 3DOKid kill the marketplace TWICE. I was getting upset before vacation and now that I'm back I read everything since then, including the little posts that were only meant to fuel the fire (you know who you are), and I felt like deleting all the posts after the December bump. So no more arguing, just wait and hope we can get what we want even if it's from someone else.

I just wanted to say i didnt feel what i and goldenband did between us, was arguing. i felt we were discussing, and im not upset with goldenband in the least, never was. But you are the admin so feel free to clean it up since we're both done, and it really had no bearing on the original issue. Im ok with that personally.

Thank you, Trev. In our newer & bigger home, I've found room to set up my consoles & got a Sony PVM Trinitron monitor that takes RGB, & I've got a SCART->RGB box. I've been delving into the world of SCART for as many systems as possible. Unfortunately, the 3DO doesn't seem to be a good candidate for a SCART mod...

jasonbar wrote:And, regarding this product vs. the elusive IDE adapter, what's the size of a full 3DO ISO image set?

Interesting question. I've got ~350 unique titles listed in a spreadsheet (copied and edited from a user who was working on a complete list), so if you figure an average of 400MB per title, that'd be a little under 140GB. Trim out compilations and demo discs, and it'd be lower; include regional variants and it'd be much higher.

And as you've seen on AtariAge, the IDE production has been discontinued in favor of a USB one.

Whatever happened to grimm (now "Anonymous"), anyway? I can't say I particularly enjoyed our interaction in this thread, but I wish him/her well wherever s/he may be.